Chiding an F.E.C. Colleague

Our Federal Election Commission colleague Ann M. Ravel would rather grandstand than follow the law and judicial precedent. We enforce the law as written by Congress and construed by the courts, not as our colleague and her “reformer” allies wish it were.

She disparages the federal courts as “a rubber-stamp approval of inaction” and essentially encourages them to disregard our governing statute and decades-old legal precedent. By recklessly accusing the courts and us of “betraying the public” and “putting our democracy in jeopardy,” our colleague is actually the one encouraging the commissioners “not to cooperate with one another” and paralyzing the F.E.C.

As for us, we will continue to follow the Supreme Court’s guidance: “Where the First Amendment is implicated, the tie goes to the speaker, not the censor.”